A Full Moon Night: A Tale of Love & Deception
It was the month of April. The almond branches were laden with flowers. Despite the frosty chill in the air, the charm of spring had arrived. Under the lofty branches and velvet valleys, snowflakes scattered like white blossoms. In the ensuing months, these white blossoms will soak in the same valley, and the color of the valley will deepen into rich green. Almonds will adorn the branches like sparkling jewels, and the fog will fade away from the mountains making them visibly clear. Along the bridge, over the lake, the soft dust of the foothills will mix with the familiar bleating of sheep, resonating with the rhythm of life. And then beneath these lofty branches, the shepherds will soon cut off wool from sheep while singing songs of love and joy.
But it was the month of April now. The leaves had not yet sprouted on the branches. The mountains were still covered with snow. The trails had not yet echoed with the bleating of the sheep. The lotus had not yet blossomed on Lake Simal. Beneath its dark green waters, the lake had yet kept hidden these lotuses like a secret that would be revealed upon the onset of spring. The blossoms on the branches of almond trees along the bridge began to sparkle. On the last night of winter in April, when almond blossoms awaken and boats glide on the lake in anticipation of spring, tiny buds of flowers on the water’s surface tremble, dancing in anticipation of the arrival of spring.
Standing on the bridge, I have been waiting patiently for a while now. The evening has faded away and the dark has begun to take its hold. The houseboats headed towards Lake Wuller had passed the pillars of the bridge. They have gone far to the extent that now they appear weak and helpless and like a fragile paper boat on the line of the horizon. The crimson hue of the evening sky spread from one end to the other, transitioning from crimson to amber, and from amber to black. Even the trail faded away in rows of the almond trees. Everything was engulfed with the silence of the night and then appeared the first star, sparkling like a lone traveler’s song. The coolness in the air intensified to the extent that it started the nostrils to freeze.
And then appeared the moon.
And there she arrived.
Walking briskly towards me, through the trail, she approached me and said, “Hi”.
She was breathing swiftly. She would pause breathing and then start taking swift breaths. She touched my shoulders with her fingers and then rested her head over it. The magic of her dense dark hair pierced through my soul and I said, “I have been waiting for you since afternoon.”
She smiled and said, “It is night now, a very beautiful night.” She put her delicately small hand over my other shoulder. It felt like a branch laden with almond blossoms had bent down and rested upon my shoulder.
She remained silent for a while. I, too, remained silent for a while. After a while, she smilingly said, “Father dropped me at the start of the trail. Because I told him that I was frightened. I want to sleep at my friend Rajjo’s house today — not sleep but stay awake all night. Because in the joy of the first blossoms of almonds, we all friends will stay awake all night and sing songs. I was preparing to come here in the afternoon. But I had to clean the rice and this pair of clothes that I washed yesterday was not dry today. I dried them on fire. And mother, too, had gone to collect wood from the jungle; she hadn’t returned yet. And until she returns, how can I bring cornbread, dried fruits, and lentils for you? Look I have brought all these for you. Lo! Are you upset? Look at me, I have come. Today is a full moon night. Let’s open the boat moored at the shore and take a tour of the lake.”
She looked at me, and I saw the love and amazement in her eyes, in which the moon was shining at that moment. And this moon was asking to go untie the boat and take a tour of the lake. Today is a love-filled festival of almond blossoms. Today she has deceived her father, her friends, her little sister, and her elder brother into meeting me. Today is a full moon night and the almond blossoms are spread all over the valley like snowflakes. And the beautiful songs of Kashmir started resonating in her chest like milk sprouting in the breasts of a milking mother. Did you see the string of pearls around her neck? This string of pearls, I put around her neck and said, “Will you stay awake the whole night today? Today is the first night of spring in Kashmir. Today the songs of Kashmir will come out of your throat like saffron blossoms on a moonlit night. Put this string of pearls on.”
The moon observed all this through the leaves, then gradually, somewhere, a nightingale began to sing on a tree, and lanterns started to flicker on the boat. And faint sound of songs was heard from the valley. The songs and children’s laughter, the deep voices of men, the sweet sounds of babies crying, and the slow emerging of smoke from chimneys on the rooftops, the scent of evening meals, fish and rice, and the soft, savory taste of spinach with lentils, and the fragrance of the full-moon night’s spring. My anger dwindled away. I held her hand and asked her “Let’s go to the lake.”
We passed the bridge, the trail, the lane of the almond trees ended, and we passed the hillock. We were now walking at the bank of the lake. The frogs were croaking in the bushes. Frogs, Crickets, and beetles, even the noise of their disorganized voices had become a melody. In between a dreamlike symphony and a sleeping lake, anchored a boat of the moon — anchored silently for a thousand years, awaiting love. Awaiting mine and my beloved’s love, yours and your beloved’s love, awaiting the quest of a man to be loved by a man. This sacred moonlit pristine night was awaiting a touch of love just like the untouched body of a maiden awaits the touch of her lover.
The boat was tied to an apricot tree which had grown right at the bank of the lake. Here, the ground was very soft, and the moonlight filtered through the leaves and was shimmering down. The frogs were croaking slightly. And the lake water repeatedly kissed the shore and its sound kept striking our ears. I surrounded my arms around her waist and embraced her tightly against my chest. In the first instance, I kissed both of her eyes — a thousand lotuses blossomed in the midst of the lake. Then I kissed her cheeks and a gentle breeze rose gradually to the echoes of songs. Then I kissed her lips and the sound of prayers was heard aloud in thousands of mosques, temples, and churches at the same time, and the flowers stars, and clouds in the sky, all started to dance at the same time out of joy.
Then I kissed her forehead, and the curves and bends of her neck, and the blossoming lotuses started to close their buds, and the songs that had grown louder gradually faded, and the dances slowed down until they came to a gradual stop.
I slowly untied the boat, she boarded the boat. I grabbed the oars and steered the boat toward the center of the lake. Here the boat stopped by itself. It moved neither forward nor backward.
I lifted the oars and placed them in the boat. She opened the bag, took out the jar of dried dates from it gave it to me, and also started eating herself.
The dates were dry and had a sweet and sour taste. “These are from the last time,” she said. I kept eating the dates and kept gazing at her. “You weren’t here the last spring,” she said slowly.
After eating the dried dates, we had apricots. At first, the apricots didn’t seem very sweet, but when dissolved in the saliva, they started to taste like honey and sugar.
“These soft ones are very sweet”, I said. “I have never eaten such apricots.”
“This is the tree of our courtyard.” She said. “Here, we only have one tree of apricots. But it produces such large, red, and sweet apricots that I don’t know what to say about it.” She exclaimed.
“When the apricots ripen, all my friends gather together and urge me to give them to eat.”
After eating the apricots, she took out the corn cob. It had a mesmerizing aroma. The golden brown corn cob and its crunchy corn were sweeter than honey.
“Very sweet”, I said while eating the corn.
“These are special corns”, she said. “These are from the last crop. I had hid them from Mother.”
I looked at her joyfully and said, “Today, it feels like everything has been fulfilled as if every wish has been granted on this full moon night. Until yesterday, it wasn’t complete; today, it is.”
She fed me the corn directly into my mouth. The warm touch of her lips still lingered on the corn. I asked, ‘Should I kiss you?”
She said, “Quiet, the boat will sink!”
“Then what shall we do?” I asked.
She said, “Let it sink.”
I still can’t forget that night. I am nearing seventy years of age, but that moonlit night is shining in my mind as if it happened just yesterday. I have never experienced such pure love until today. She, too, would never have experienced such purity in love. That magic was beyond this world. It was the magic of that moonlit night that she never went back home. She ran away with me that night. And full of love, we wandered, in the jungles, near the lake shores, and under the shadows of apricot trees for five or six days just like kids, unaware of the world. Then I bought a small house near the shore of that very lake and we started living there. After a month I went to Srinagar and told her that I would come back in three days. On the third day when I arrived, what I saw was that she talking to a young man quite frankly. What I saw was that both of them were eating from the same plate and were feeding each other. I saw them but they didn’t see me. They were so involved in each other that they did not notice my presence. He may be a lover from the previous spring or even before that spring when I wasn’t there. Probably, how many more such springs would come in the future where she would be visited by her previous lovers before I came into her life, how many moonlit nights would come when love would become naked like a prostitute and dance? “Today, autumn has engulfed my home. So what am I here to do now?” I said to myself. So I left from there forever, never to return, never to meet my first love ever.
And now I have returned after 48 years. My sons are with me. My wife has left for her heavenly abode but my daughter-in-laws and grandchildren are with me. While taking a tour, we casually came to the shore of Simal Lake. It is the month of April and it has turned from afternoon to evening. I, while standing on the bridge for quite some time now, am seeing the lane of apricot trees. And, the clusters of white blossoms sway gently in the cool breeze. Along the embankment, I do not hear the familiar sound of some footsteps approaching. A beautiful young girl rushes across the bridge, holding a small bag in her hands, and my heart skips a beat. Far away a wife is calling her husband. She is calling him for dinner. The sound of a closing door is heard somewhere from a surrounding. And the voice of a crying child suddenly calms down. Smoke is coming out of the chimneys and birds are going back to their abode, sitting on the trees while flapping their wings.
While I cross the bridge, my sons, their wives, and their children follow me so. They are scattered in different groups. The lane of almond trees here has ended. It is the shore of the lake. The apricot tree is there. Look how large it has become. The boat is there. But is it the same boat? In front, I see that house, the house of my first spring, the house of my first moonlit night love.
The house is lit, and children are shouting. Someone starts singing in a deep voice. An old lady shouts to quite the singing voice. I thought to myself, almost half a century has passed since I haven’t seen this house. What is the harm in seeing it now? After all, I bought it and as one can see, I am still the owner of this house. What is so wrong in seeing it? And I entered the house.
Very beautiful little kids these are. A young lady was preparing dinner for her husband and was astonished after seeing me. Two children were fighting who stopped fighting after seeing me. The old lady, who was still scolding out of anger, calmed down after seeing me and asked, “Who I am?”
“This is my house”, I said.
“Is it of your father?” she said.
“It is not of my father, it is mine. I had bought it some forty-eight years ago. I have come to see it only, not to vacate it from you people”, I said. I started to leave as I said this. That is when the old lady’s fingers stiffened firmly on the utensils. She pulled her breath deep inside and said, “So it is you. How could a person recognize after so many years?”
She stood there quietly and I stood in the lawn quietly for a long time and kept looking at her. Then she herself said with a smile, come let me introduce you to my family members. “Look this is my elder son, he is the younger one, she is the wife of my elder son, he is my elder grandson – offer greetings to the guest son, this is my granddaughter and this is my husband. Sssshhhh… keep quiet, don’t wake him up, he has been sick since the day before yesterday. He has taken a seductive.”
“How may I serve you”, she asked.
My eyes got stuck on the corn cobs hanging on the front wall of the lawn. She noticed and said with a smile, “Most of my teeth have fallen out, the ones that are left don’t work.”
“Same is my condition too; I won’t be able to eat corn,” I replied.
My family members, too, had entered the house as they saw me entering. Now the house was crowded. Children had become accustomed to each other. We slowly found our way out of the house and walked slowly to the lake shore.
“I waited for you for six years. Why didn’t you come that day?” she asked.
“I had come but found you with another man, so I left”, I said. “Yes you were eating dinner with him from the same plate and you both were feeding each other with your hands,” I added.
She suddenly became quiet and then started laughing loudly.
“What happened”, I asked in surprise.
“Oh, that was my brother”, she said.
She again burst into laughter. “He had come to meet me. He was leaving. Since you were supposed to come that day. I stopped him, saying he should meet you before leaving. But you didn’t come that day.”
She suddenly became serious. “I waited six years for you. After you left, God blessed me with a son, your son. But he died a year later. I waited four years more for you, but you didn’t come. Then I got married.”
Two children came out of the house. While playing, one child started feeding corn to the other child.
“He is my grandson,” She said.
“She is my granddaughter”, I said.
They both ran along the shore of the lake, enjoying the beautiful moments of life. We kept watching them for a long time. She came closer to me and said, “I feel good today since you are here. I have built my life now. I have seen all its joys and sorrows. My house is filled with happiness, and today, since you are here too, I don’t feel bad at all.”
“I feel the same way. I thought I would never meet you throughout my life. That’s why I never came here for so many years. But now that I’m here, it doesn’t feel bad at all, not even a little bit” I said.
We both got silent. The children came to us. She picked my granddaughter and kissed her, and I picked her grandson and kissed him. And we both started looking at each other smiling. The moon was shining in her eyes, and that moon, with surprise and delight, was saying with joy, “People may die, but life survives and goes on; springs may fade away, but then another spring arrives; trivial love affairs may come to an end, but the larger and splendorous loves of life thrives forever. You two were not together in the previous spring, you are together in the present but you may not be together in the next one. But life will be there, and youth, beauty, elegance, and innocence, too, will remain.
The children slipped from our laps because they wanted to play separately from us. They ran to the apricot tree where the boat was tied.
“Is this the same tree?” I asked.
“Not it’s not” she replied with a smile.
